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The Bowl was alive with the Sound of Music

Sunday, July 1, 2007

Last night I went to a Sound of Music sing-a-long at The Hollywood Bowl. I've been dying to go to one ever since watching the Will & Grace episode Von Trapped and being a fan of the Academy Award winning musical since I was a little kid made it all the nicer. No, I didn't drag Raphael to this event with me, he escaped this time, instead I went with two other female fans. This was also my first time frequenting the infamous Bowl (which was awesome). The sing-a-long is quite a big deal out here too being sold out for it's sixth striaght year.

As expected the crowd of 17,416 people was mainly women, gay men and families with little kids.

The show started with a parade of fans who wore costumes to look like the characters from the musical as well as objects seen and lyrics heard throughout the flick. For example, besides all the Von Trapp children and Maria look-a-likes, there was one person dressed as a chair with a pine cone on it. The grand prize winner was dressed as a large hand holding a moon beam as in "How do you hold a moon beam in your hand?" from the song How do you solve a problem like Maria? Yes, a lot of time on people's hands. Although, I shouldn't talk since I wore a white dress with a blue sash as in "girls in white dresses with blue satin sashes." I know, I'm a geek. There were several other girls with the same idea and got to go up on stage, but they had actual satin sashes, mine on the other hand was just regular blue fabric. If I attend again next year I'm going early and going up on that stage, I even have an idea for a costume but that will remain classified since the grand prize winner won a seven day Mexican cruise and I'm going to be in it to win it.

After the winners were announced, the actual film started to much applause and with the words to each song appearing at the bottom of the screen for everyone to join in, which they did. Similar to The Rocky Horror Picture Show performances in New York, it was very interactive; people would shout out things and boo when the Nazi's came on screen, things like that. When the Baroness appeared on screen, one woman yelled out "gold digger" and during So Long Farewell, everyone waved and echoed "goodbye" just like the people at the ball do in the movie. Also, during Edelweiss the crowd took out their cell phones and waved them slowly back and forth like lighters, creating a sea of fluttering glow bugs.

Luckily, I've seen the film too many times to count otherwise I would have been annoyed that I couldn't hear parts of the dialogue or see properly when people covered the screen with laser pointers. It was annoying, but at least it didn't ruin the movie for me.

Oh and the event was hosted by Melissa Peterman from Reba, who I barely recognized since she lost a lot of weight and looks amazing, she was also really funny and did a good job emceeing.

Another really cool thing about The Bowl is that they let you bring in your own food and drink, similar to the picnics or movies under the stars events that I used to attend in Manhattan parks. So we did a little picnic before the screening.